Driving home our advantage

WHERE can you drive a 210-kilometre beach highway through World Heritage listed landscapes and truly unique environments?

Where can you find more bird species than Kakadu?

The answer is right in our backyard.

So why aren't we marketing it?

That's the big question Wade Batty has asked for years.

And now that he is one of Queensland Tourism's leading lights with the 2010 Hall of Fame award to prove it, when Wade asks a question like that, industry organisations ought to listen.

“We have World Heritage listed Fraser Island sitting on our doorstep, it is like what the Daintree is to Cairns or Port Douglas – it is recognised as a gateway to such a spectacular part of the country.

“And we have this fantastic beach highway from Noosa all the way to Fraser and we don't use it.

“People fly into Hervey Bay and go to Fraser Island, or they go straight past us and we are losing that business.

“Where else can you drive for 56 miles along one beach and then jump on another that is 75 miles long? Fraser has the longest beach on earth and we're not promoting it, it's so frustrating.

“I know that Cooloola National Park will be put up for World Heritage listing in 2012 and we are already in one of the most pristine natural environments in Queensland.

Of course, his business is perfectly poised to benefit from such a marketing push, offering as it does tours through the Noosa Everglades and on Fraser Island.

It has won the 2008, 2009 and 2010 Queensland Tourism award for best tour operator, including a national win in 2009 and entry into the hall of fame this year.

“It takes a lot of hard work, sacrifice and dedication,” he said.

“We didn't enter those awards for any reason other than to challenge ourselves and learn what we could do better.

“We thought we had a good operation, but we wanted to see how good we really were.

“It hasn't necessarily translated to any financial reward for us in the last three years, but for us to build this business like we have and to get these accolades is all the more rewarding.”

Mr Batty said the business had managed to stay viable despite some big hits, common to many in tourism.

“The weather has been terrible, we lost $500,000 in the Kin Kin floods last year because we were locked out of the Everglades for three months.

“The industry is slack, inbound tourism is down because of the dollar and domestic tourism is down because everyone is going outbound.

“We've managed to survive because we've adapted. For our Fraser Island business we had six Landcruisers charging $200 a seat and we started to feel that market was not coming to the Coast, so we invested $750,000 to build three larger vehicles for Fraser Island – which is something no one in their right mind would do.

“We approached the bank, put a plan together and the bank says “what are you doing” but that's saved us. We met the market.

“That has enabled us to get a full time mechanic and pick up the Contiki contract because we have that larger capacity.”